


Love Letters

by augustmonsoon



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-03
Updated: 2016-01-03
Packaged: 2018-05-11 13:40:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5628595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/augustmonsoon/pseuds/augustmonsoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peggy’s heart pounded; each heartbeat a visceral punch to her ribcage.  She tried to calm herself. She’d seen off murderers, psychotic killers, so why, when faced with no one but her best friend, was she lost?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Letters

**Author's Note:**

> My first ever Cartinelli fic! Massive thank you smoreish and Vaishnavi for being my lovely first readers, all inaccuracies that remain are mine alone. Needless to say, I do not own these characters.

_But deep in my heart_  
I know that you love me  
You love me, because you told me so

 - _Love Letters, Nat King Cole_

_*_

Peggy’s heart pounded; each heartbeat a visceral punch to her ribcage. She tried to calm herself. She’d seen off murderers, psychotic killers, so why, when faced with no one but her best friend, was she lost?

Words kept sticking in her throat, her lips forming soundlessly.

‘I love you’ she whispered finally, the words came out strangulated. She hated the plaintive tone in her voice, how desperate she sounded, how laid bare. She had said as much to Angie before, in various guises, truncated, thrown casually over her shoulder as she left for work, with pathetic gratitude when Angie came bearing coffee, in peals of laughter as Angie told one of her stories. But none of those had made the earth stop still, none had frozen time quite like this.

The pause that followed was deafening.

Then, she felt Angie cup the angle of her jaw. Her world zeroed in on the feather soft pressure, every nerve ending zinging with the heat of Angie’s palm, the ridges of Angie’s fingertips. Imperceptibly, she leant into the touch.

Angie nudged Peggy’s face upwards, curling her fingers around the nape of her neck, bringing her closer.

‘Look at me,’ Peggy lifted her gaze.

The late autumnal light had filtered in through the shuttered windows, and illuminated Angie in shards of gold.

‘I love you,’ a softness had descended on Angie, she moved closer still, they were too close for words now. Peggy could feel the press of Angie’s knees against her legs, the sharp dig of her joints should have been uncomfortable but somehow wasn’t. She could feel the soft rhythm of Angie’s breath against her cheek, the scratch of Angie’s woollen skirt against her calves, the heat of Angie’s body searing through her clothes and electrifying her skin. Sensations had become abstracted, zoomed in, acutely in focus but displaced, somehow brand new, as if they’d descended inside a Picasso.

_I should kiss her_. This was not a new thought. It had occurred almost on a daily basis to Peggy, ever since she’d walked into the diner for the first time. She thought it whenever Angie came and sat her table at the diner between belligerent customers and leant in and told her the day’s gossip in a conspiratorial whisper. She had thought it the Valentine’s day when they’d both been alone and feeling sorry for themselves with too much Schnapps, whirling each other in their pyjamas to Nat King Cole on the radio.

But before she could act, the lemon sharpness struck a clearer note. Peggy could feel the tiny contours of Angie’s lips against hers. Instinctively, she snaked her arms around Angie. She began to part her lips - the telephone rang, it’s attention seeking jangle renting the moment in two.

Two futures blossomed. Pull away or stay.

Shaking, Peggy stood and went to pick up the receiver. It was Mr Jarvis. The city needed saving. _They won’t thank you, you know_ , said a voice in her head. She thought of Thompson and the chief and the all the rest of them, all of whom saw in her nothing but Captain America’s piece of tail. They held her in contempt but were jealous too, which made them hate her all the more. _There are other agents_ , said the voice, but another said, _they’re not you, could you live with yourself if something happened_? She tried not to look at Angie. Finally she thought, _Angie’ll understand, if this is real, she’ll want me to go_. She prayed she was right.

Angie stared at the pages in front of her, the text blurring with her manic determination to not look anywhere else. She mumbled a reply to Peggy’s apologies and dared to look up only when the door to apartment had slammed shut. She thought of the nameless danger that must’ve called Peggy away. _Keep her safe_ she whispered, to whom, she wasn’t sure, the city perhaps. _Bring her back safe_.

But Angie wasn’t to see the door open to reveal Peggy for the next few days. She went about her routine trying not to stare too hard at the door whenever she heard the clatter of heels in the corridor.

Peggy spent day and night in various cars with Jarvis, stalking the latest Hydra operative around New York. The afternoon played constantly in her mind.

*

Peggy collapsed into an aisle seat, on stage; Angie was curled up next to a bearded young man. They sat facing each other, illuminated in a pool of soft light, in an embrace that was oblivious of the audience.

The man stretched out his arm and placed his hand over Angie’s. Her hand was engulfed in his.

‘I love you,’ his eyes were downcast, unable to meet hers. His voice was so raw, that the audience leaned in closer, becoming voyeurs to this acutely private moment.

Peggy watched the two of them, somehow strangely detached, caught in the spider’s web of her own memories. As if by proxy, Peggy felt the heat of Angie’s hand, without thinking her own hand went up the curve of her jaw where Angie had held her, she found her face was burning.

Peggy watched Angie’s lips move on stage, she already knew the words, the phantom Angie who lived in Peggy’s head said these very words on loop. The two Angies, real and wishful professed their love in sync. Each inflection was identical, every drop of tender agony the same. If she had hoped for some sign that this would a cheap imitation of the afternoon they’d shared, there was none.

Peggy felt shame rising up her throat like bile. She had been a fool to think that that afternoon had been anything other than what Angie had said it was; practice; practice for this.

On stage, Angie and the bearded boy were moments from the kiss. Peggy looked away as Angie’s lips touched his.

She felt hollowed.

Peggy stood, as if pulled by strings. She felt caught in a hidden trap. In agony, she struggled blindly against the inexplicable pain; all that mattered to her was to put as much distance between her and the stage, her and Angie as she could. Quietly, and with as much dignity as she could muster, she inched herself away from the rows of seats and hurried up the aisle. Once out of the theatre, she ran, heels clattering in staccato rhythm on the tiled floor. The night air outside enveloped her, plunging her into ice water, forcing tendrils of cold down her throat, making her retch with the pain and grief.

From the corner of her eye Angie saw Peggy leave as a blur of red dress and clatter of heels just as she broke away from the kiss.

A tiny, possessive part rejoiced at the possibility that Peggy had been too jealous to stay a moment longer. Reason said _as if, Angie; you wish._

It was late when she got back home, but the strip of light under the threshold of Peggy’s door gave her hope.

‘You okay, English?’ she called.

A muffled reply came back. Peggy sounded as if she’d been crying. Angie heard her come to the door and stop, imagined her hand hovering above the chain. Angie waited, each breath falling in time with Peggy’s, heart thumping painfully against her chest. She willed Peggy to be braver than she was.

 

The door did not open.

 

 

 


End file.
